


Surrender

by Alixtii



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2006-05-23
Updated: 2006-06-01
Packaged: 2017-10-08 18:48:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/78486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alixtii/pseuds/Alixtii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"No," said Buffy. "I can't beat you. You win."</i></p><p>Buffy surrenders to Spike, who is armed with the Gem of Amara, and he kills her. But while the rogue slayer Faith wakes up from her coma and goes after Spike, the hell-god Glorificus is aiming for Faith's little sister, Dawn.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Beginning of the End

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deadsoul28](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=deadsoul28).



> **Timeline/Spoilers:** Goes AU during "Harsh Light of Day." Spoilers up to "The Gift."

Giles will never forget the moment when the world changed.

They carried her to him: broken, battered, beaten. Willow held the door open as Oz and Xander gently brought her into Giles' apartment and laid his Slayer on the couch.

That was the beginning of the end.

* * *

"Her leg is broken—and so is her wrist," Giles said. "Dawn? Could you get the first aid kit?"

The fourteen-year-old girl was off, racing up the stairs to fetch the kit. Giles continued to exam Buffy. The broken leg and wrist were her worst injuries, but she was covered from head to toe in cuts and bruises. Her breathing was labored but steady.

"Will she be okay?" Willow asked. "He was beating her pretty badly. It was all we could do to distract him and get her away."

"She'll live," Giles said curtly. Slayer healing could take care of a lot, although this would tax it to its foremost. "The important thing is to stop the bleeding."

Dawn returned with the first aid kit. Giles pulled out the ammonium carbonate packet first, broke it open underneath Buffy's nose. Her breathing grew quicker, and after a few moments she opened her eyes. "Huh?" she asked groggily.

Oz and Xander had already pulled out the gauze from the kit and had begun bandaging her cuts. Giles turned back to the broken leg. Once Xander was done wrapping it, he would set the splint.

"How are you feeling, Buffy?" asked Willow.

"Like shit," she answered, then grimaced and looked at Dawn. "Sorry, Giles."

"I wouldn't expect anything less," said Giles smoothly. "Dawn, could you call Joyce, tell her that Buffy is going to be staying here tonight? We won't be able to move her for a couple of days."

"What are we going to do in the meantime?" asked Xander. "Spike is still on the loose."

"It doesn't matter," Buffy said weakly. "Giles, he's invincible. I can't beat him."

"Don't talk that way," Willow said. "We'll find a way. There has to be something we can do."

"No," said Buffy. "There's nothing we can do. Spike's unstoppable." And then she closed her eyes and lost consciousness once again.

* * *

"Are we really going to give up?" Dawn asked him that night when she was finished watching Roswell . "Just let Spike win?"

Giles couldn't help but glance at the unconscious Slayer. "I don't know, Dawn," he said at last. "Go to bed."

Dawn made a face as she turned off the television but obediently began up the steps towards her bedroom. Halfway up, she paused and turned back to Giles. "Buffy's the Slayer," she said. "If she gives up, what's left?"

Giles didn't answer, and after a moment Dawn continued up the steps silently, leaving him alone with Buffy. "Les saules trempés," he recited quietly to himself, "et des bourgeons sur les ronces—C'est là, dans une averse, qu'on s'abrite. J'avais sept ans, elle était plus petite. Elle était toute mouilée, je lui ai donné des primevères." _She was wet and cold, and I gave her primroses._

He placed a blanket over his sleeping Slayer, and then, with the feeling that it was a gesture of some poetic significance, turned away from her, prepared to go and give himself up to unconsciousness as he had commanded Dawn do, for the simple reason that there was nothing else that he could do.

* * *

"While _The Changeling_ seems to merely be about the machinations of a group of nobles, its lunatic asylum subplot signals a deeper level of meaning. These two levels of meaning reinforce each other as they each provide a thematic counterpoint." At least it was something like that that Dawn's English teacher was saying. She wasn't really paying attention.

"Antonio and Franciscus, the counterfeit madmen, demonstrate to us . . . Miss Lehane?"

Dawn looked up at the sound of her own name, startled. "Yes?"

"Perhaps you could tell us what Antonio and Franciscus demonstrate to us?"

Dawn frowned, trying to think fast. "They're actually nobles pretending to be insane, so that . . . they show us that . . . we should look deeper when we read the play? Not be confused by appearances?"

"An impressive feat of thinking on your feet, Miss Lehane," her teacher admitted. "However, you might find you are even more effectively able to engage the text if you actually _listen_ to my lecture. I don't know what's going on in your head that is so much more important, but I assure you it wouldn't be the end of the world if you paid attention to me for a change."

No, mused Dawn. It wouldn't be the end of the world. The end of the world was a vampire getting his hands on—what was it called? The Gem of Amoretta?—and now Buffy Summers, the Vampire Slayer and protector of humankind, was powerless to stop him.

Of course, her teacher just continued to drone right on. "Their subterfuge reveals to us the fluidity of identity. 'What makes a self?' the play asks. What do Franciscus the madman and Franciscus the noble have in common? Anything?"

* * *

It was days before Buffy was well enough for the Scoobies to convene. They set a time in late afternoon, so not as to conflict with Willow's classes or Xander's job. Dawn was already home from school, and was doing her homework in the kitchen without ever so much as looking at Buffy or Giles. Xander arrived first, with Willow and Oz arriving a few minutes later. They all seated themselves in the living room.

"Dawn," Giles said, "go up to your room."

She had already opened her mouth to complain when Buffy said, "No. She deserves to be here too." Buffy paused, looking at every one of the Scoobies in succession. After a long pause, she sighed, and began to speak. "You all saw what happened when I tried to take on Spike. With the Gem of Amara, he's invincible. There's no way that I can beat him."

There was a silence. "So what are you saying?" asked Willow. "That we just . . . give up?"

"I don't know what else we can do," Buffy answered.

"You can't seriously be saying this," Xander argued.

"There has to be another way," insisted Willow. "Maybe we could call Angel and—"

"No," said Buffy. "Spike's unstoppable. Involving Angel would only get him killed."

"Then a spell, maybe," she said. "We could—"

"Do what?" Buffy asked. "You've been over the books, Willow. What do you seriously suggest we can do?"

"I don't care what you say," Xander said. "There's always another way."

"Not always," Oz answered simply.

Dawn stood up. "So what happens to us?" she asked. "We just let Spike kill us all?" She ran upstairs, and they could all hear the slam of her bedroom door behind her. The other Scoobies just sat there, in silence.

"Giles, there isn't any other way."

He nodded at last. "I know."

* * *

They found Spike that evening on the UCSD campus, near Lowell House. It was not yet twilight, and the sun could be still be seen over the buildings which lined the horizon. If it were not for the Gem of Amara, Spike would be ashes just by being out at such a time. As it was, he wore a pair of sleek sunglasses and a predatory grin. "Come for more, Slayer?"

"No," said Buffy. "I can't beat you. You win."

"We have come to negotiate terms," Giles announced. "What is it that you want, Spike?"

"What do you think I want?" Spike said. "I want you, Slayer."

"Okay," said Buffy. "You can have me. Kill me, then leave Sunnydale and never come back. Promise to stay away from here and from L.A., and you can do whatever you want to me."

Spike smiled, took a step towards Buffy, and placed a hand on her face, feeling the contour of her jaw and following it down to her neck and then her breast. He grabbed her shirt and pulled it over her head; limply, Buffy let her arms rise and fall as the shirt pulled them up.

Xander took a deep breath, and Oz quickly reached out with his left hand, grabbing Xander's right wrist and holding the boy in place. Giles reached out and held his other hand. Buffy had made her decision; it was not their place to interfere.

Spike continued to undress Buffy as she just stood there, not helping him but not resisting either. Her bra, her shoes and socks, her jeans, and finally her underwear, until she stood there completely naked in the twilight. He kissed her, slipping his tongue into her mouth, and still she stood still, not resisting. Spike unzippered his fly, then, picked Buffy up, and slammed her against the outer wall of Lowell House as he thrust into her.

Xander looked away, unable to watch. Willow closed her eyes; Oz slipped his free hand hand into hers. Giles stared forward, unblinking, not letting himself turn away from the sight of his Slayer defeated, forcing himself to face the very truth of his failure.

Spike's triumphant moans and Buffy's reluctant whimpers blended together to form a cacophonous duet, culminating in a grotesque crescendo. Then, in the silence which followed, he sank his fangs into her neck.

When he was finished, he dropped Buffy and let her naked, lifeless body fall to the ground. "I'll be going, then," he said, and walked out of their lives for what Giles seriously hoped would be forever.

* * *

And in the coma ward of Sunnydale Medical, Faith dreamed.


	2. The Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a series of bizarre dream sequences, Faith wakes up from her coma.

"Jack Horner was a pretty lad; near London he did dwell," a soft, lilting voice sang out in a British accent. "His father's heart he made full glad, his mother lov'd him well."

"Huh?" asked Faith. "What does that mean?"

The singing woman, dressed in a red Oriental pantsuit, only shrugged and began to dance. At her feet on the dirt floor lay a dead Asian girl. "She was a Slayer," Faith realized.

Then the face of the fallen Asian Slayer changed, and suddenly was a black woman—and then it changed again, and was Buffy. In a blink, the Slayer was Asian again and nothing had ever happened.

The dark-haired woman smiled at Faith. "When friends did together meet, to pass away the time, why little Jack be sure would eat his Christmas pie in rhyme."

* * *

"They smell good don't they?"

"What?" asked Faith as she helped Buffy make the bed.

"Clean sheets," Buffy explained. "Like summer."

Faith shrugged. "I wouldn't know."

"Right," Buffy frowned. "I forgot."

"I noticed," Faith mentioned as she tucked the edge of the sheet under the mattress..

"I wish I could stay, but—" Buffy trailed off, gesturing with her head to the corner of the room where a silver-haired man was fucking Buffy naked against the wall.

"Oh, you have to go."

Buffy looked uncomfortable. "It's just that—"

"I understand," said Faith. "Out, out brief candle, and all that jazz."

"You have things to do yourself, you know," Buffy said. "Little sis is coming. So much to do before she gets here." She sighed. "Now I really have to—"

"So go. Don't let me keep."

It was then she noticed the blood dripping onto the white sheet which covered the bed. She looked down, realized the blood was coming from the knife in her abdomen. "Damn," said Faith. "Just when we'd made it so nice."

Buffy looked at the knife, not saying anything.

"Are you ever gonna take this thing out?" Faith asked.

Buffy put out her hand, took grasp of the knife's hilt and then, in a single motion, pulled.

* * *

"Think it's gonna rain?" asked Faith.

"Nonsense," said the Mayor. "It's a beautiful day. Now eat your sandwich."

"I don't know," Faith said uncertainly. "It just always seems like it starts raining about now."

"You're too young and too pretty a girl to start wearing worry lines on your face," the Mayor said firmly. He picked up a garter snake off the blanket. "Hey there, little fella," he said, talking to the snake. "I dunno where you belong, but it's not here with us." He laughed gently as he put the snake down on the far corner of the blanket. "There you go," he said, then turned back to Faith. "You see, there's nothing going to spoil our time together. Who wants cheese cake?"

Faith smiled, enjoying the moment, when suddenly she looked up and saw, standing behind the Mayor—

"No," she shouted as Buffy used Faith's knife to slit his throat, then ran Faith's knife through him.

"I told you we had things to do," said Buffy, as Faith began to run away. "Didn't I?"

Faith ran as fast as her legs would carry her, out of the park and into the desert. She ran until she could run no longer, and then, panting, rested. She looked behind her. "Why are you still here?" she asked Buffy, surprised.

"I was borrowed," Buffy answered. "Someone has to speak for her."

A dark-skinned woman crouched slow as she circled Faith and Buffy, not taking her eyes off Faith. She was dressed in rags, and mud was streaked across her face in a ceremonial manner like she was some sort of tribal shaman or something.

"Let her speak for herself," Faith said. "That's what's done in polite circles, right? Not that I'd know, of course. What does she want from me?"

"Nothing," answered Buffy, her voice oddly toneless.

"Buffy, what's happening?" A note of desperation seeped into Faith's voice.

"You're asking the wrong questions."

"Who is she?" asked Faith. "Why doesn't she say anything?"

"She has no speech. No name. She lives in the action of death, the blood cry, the penetrating wound. She is destruction. Absolute. Alone."

"But we're not alone," Faith answered, unsure whether she was talking to Buffy or to the strange woman. "They're two of us, remember? We can watch each others' backs."

"The Slayer does not walk in this world."

"Come on, B'," Faith pleaded. "I don't know anyone more alive than you. You walk. You talk, you shop, you sneeze, you fuck."

Buffy shook her head. "I'm sorry, Faith," she said. "You're going to have to trade. You don't get to be you anymore."

"Trade? What do you mean?"

Buffy pointed across the desert to where that silver-haired man was fucking her against the wall. "It's your turn now." She smiled sadly, looked at the strange woman. "I'm with her now."

"Buffy, I can't do it alone," Faith begged. "I need you to help me. I love you."

"No!" the strange woman shouted in a deep, hoarse voice. "No love! Just the kill! We are alone!"

The woman attacked, and Faith was forced to fight back, pulling the woman down to the ground, wrestling with her in the sand. Only the sand wasn't sand anymore, but a grave. "That's it," Faith decided. "I'm waking up. It's over. We don't do this any more."

And she pulled herself out of the grave.

* * *

And, alone, in a hospital bed, Faith Lehane awoke from her coma.


	3. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Woken up from her coma, Faith seeks out old friends and family--and is sought out.

When Dawn got out of school, Giles was waiting for her. Only he wasn't waiting for her like time-to-pick-you-up-and-bring-you-home-from-school Giles. He was standing there much more like I-have-bad-news Giles. Possibly, the world was ending. Again.

"What is it?" Dawn asked, her heart plunging into her stomach.

"It's your sister," Giles answered. "She's woken up."

Dawn could feel her chin quivering. "Can I see her?"

Giles shook his head. "No one knows where she is. She beat someone up, took her clothing and disappeared out of the hospital. The police will be looking for them."

The two of them began to walk to Giles' car. "So what are we going to do?"

"We need to find her," Giles said. "But our first concern is keeping you safe. I don't want to chance the possibility of you running into—"

"Into me?" Faith interrupted, from where she was sitting on the hood of Giles' car. "Hey, sis. Miss me?"

Giles moved slightly, positioning himself between Dawn and Faith. Which was stupid, really. Dawn knew that Faith wouldn't hurt her. She just wasn't sure she could say the same about Giles.

"What do you want, Faith?" Giles asked.

Faith looked hurt. "I can't stop by to see my own little sister?" She shrugged, jumped off Giles' car. "I'm looking for 'B. Fancy she might be looking for me, too."

"Buffy's dead, Faith," Giles said, his voice grave. "She was killed by a vampire armed with the Ring of Amara. Spike."

Faith stopped, the surprise evident on her face. "Well, that does put a wrinkle in my plans," she admitted. "Any idea where I might find this Spike?"

"None," answered Giles. "He left town."

"Well, I'll just have to find him, won't I?" Faith asked. It was then that one could begin to hear the sirens as police cars began to pull up in the school parking lot.

Faith pushed her way past Giles, kissed Dawn lightly on the cheek, and ran away.

* * *

"Spike," Faith said. "I hear he's known around these parts. A vampire."

"I know who you mean," the vampire Faith had held up against the wall said nervously. "He's not here. He's left town."

"So I've heard," Faith said, pushing him harder. "Any clue where he might have gone?"

"Last I heard," the vampire said, "he was traveling north. Up the 101. I don't know where he was going—don't think he knew himself."

Faith let the vampire down, released him. "You get ten seconds," she said. "That's it." The vampire ran away as she began to count. "Ten. Nine."

On "eight" she threw a stake after him. It landed right in his heart. Dust.

Faith smiled. She might have spent the last eight months unconscious in a hospital bed, but that didn't mean she didn't still have it.

"Faith," an ominously booming voice broke in. "A friend sent me. I got a little remembrance from him—" Not letting the demon finish, Faith reached up and broke his neck, letting him fall to the ground. An envelope fell out of its coat onto the ground; when she picked it up and examined it she saw that it had her name written on the front.

Of course, that had to be the moment that a police car just had to come by. Faith hurriedly jumped onto a nearby fire escape and pulled herself up out of sight.

When she was safely out of sight on the top of the roof, she opened the envelope. Inside were a videocassette and a small black box.

Luckily, she was right on top of an electronics store. Perfect. She broke in, found a VCR and pushed play.

The sight that appeared on her television screen was a familiar one: an office. Not any office, of course—his office. The mayor's. And there he was, sitting at his desk, that infectious smile of his on his face. "Hello, Faith," he said. If you're watching this tape, it can only mean one thing. I'm dead. And our noble campaign to bring order to the town of Sunnydale has failed, utterly and completely."

He stood up walked around to the front of his desk. "But on the other hand, heck, maybe we won." He laughed, that crazy laugh of his. "And right now, I'm on some jumbo monitor in the Richard Wilkins museum surrounded by a bunch of kids sitting Indian style and looking up at my face filled with fear and wonder. Hi, kids!"

Faith smiled despite herself. Yeah, that was the mayor, all right.

"But the realist in me tends to doubt it," he said. He sat on his desk, and his face grew serious. "Now, Faith, as I record this message you're sleeping. And the doctors tell me you might never wake up. I don't believe that. Sooner or later you will wake up, and when you do, you'll find the world has gone and changed on you."

He had no idea.

"I wish I could make the world a better place for you to wake up in. But, tough as it is to accept, we both have to understand that even my power to protect and watch over you has its limits. See, the hard pill to swallow is that once I'm gone, your days are just plain numbered. Now, I know, you're a smart and capable young woman in charge of her own life, but the problem, Faith, is that there won't be a place in the world for you anymore. By now I bet you're feeling very much alone."

Buffy was dead. That meant she was alone. The one and only Slayer.

"But you're never alone," Mayor Wilkins said. "You'll always have me."

He picked up what was clearly the same little black box she had found in the envelope. "And you'll always have this." He laughed. "Go ahead. Open the box."

Faith picked up the box, looked at it. "Don't worry," the image of the mayor on the screen said. "It's not gonna bite. That's my job." He laughed some more. "Go ahead. Open it."

Faith opened it. Inside there was a small metal gadget.

"Surprise!" the mayor said. "You won't find these in any gumball machine. See, when you've been around as long as I have, you make friends. And some of them forge neat little gizmos like the one you're holding right now. And here's the good news: just because it's over for my Faith, doesn't mean she can't go out with a bang."

Faith just stared at the gadget in her hand, thinking and remembering.

* * *

"So did she go to kill Spike," Xander asked, "or to thank him?"

"Honestly, Xander," Giles admitted, "I'm not sure."

The group—Willow, Oz, Xander, and Dawn—were one again gathered in Gile's living room. It felt oddly strange to have them all together without Buffy there, but they couldn't just ignore what was happening around them. Someone had to continue to guard Sunnydale, after all. Without Buffy, their paltry talents were now desperately needed.

But what they really needed was a Slayer. And the only living Slayer was, as best they knew, already on her way to meet the invincible vampire who had killed her predecessor.

"Well, maybe one of them will kill the other," Willow offered, hopefully. "That'd be a good thing, right? Then we'd just have to deal with one bad guy."

"Talking about my sister here," Dawn reminded the group.

"Or maybe they'll team up and take over the world together," Xander responded to Willow, ignoring Dawn. "Two homicidal psychotics should get along just fine."


End file.
